Archive of Our Own ^beta

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· I know this is one that no one likes to read, but this goes for anything, if you don't practice, or go back to look at your work, you are going to miss hundreds of mistakes. Even with editing, and now having a friend who helps me to edit, I still miss things, it's not the end of the world, but your writing will improve greatly if you edit. (Later on down the line I will have more tips on how to make this easier...but I hadn't figured them out by this story yet.)

-Writing on paper before typing! (I am so excited to finally share this!)

· This is an editing technique I picked up by accident, but it helps SO MUCH!!! When I was writing one of my stories, I was taking classes and would often want to write before they began, so I kept a notebook on me in which I wrote the story down. Then once it was finished I began typing up the story to post, and I quickly found myself editing as I typed! Now, this works because, if you just type the story and edit it in the same document or type it into another document, you are tempted to just copy and paste, and this means you aren't focusing on the details as much. Since you are essentially rewriting the story when you go from a handwritten copy to a typed copy, you have more chances to flush out mistakes, catch inconsistencies, come up with better way to say things, better ideas overall, etc. This tactic has worked wonders for me, and I think is one of the reasons I saw improvement in my writing in this story. It is a great form of editing that really doesn't feel like editing!

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I can't stress this enough, whether you are just starting out or you're at J.K. Rowling or J.R.R Tolkien levels of experience KEEP WRITING!!!

· You are going to run into complications and conflicts while writing, but it is important to power through them and keep going. If you do, you will come out of the situation a better author. Some stories won't be up to your expectations, but in the end that is okay, because you can learn from your mistakes and know how to avoid them in the next story you write.

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· I always believe it is constructive to have older works to look back on. This allows you to see how far you have come and how much you have improved.

-Don't be afraid to go out of your comfort zone!

· Like I said before, I don't write much fluff, so this was out of the ordinary for me, but like I said, I had fun writing it, and it is one of the stories that you guys seem to like most! 

-Don't be afraid of adding detail!

· This is a pit fall I ran into A LOT when I was first starting out, honestly most of my stories looked more like scripts than fictional writings, and this is a story that I felt I really didn't spend enough time on the details. The story feels a bit rushed, but part of that is because, I didn't want someone coming out with a story along the same lines and then have people tell me I stole the idea...

- Don't be afraid to try something new or "out of the box"

· Of course you always want to try to be unique, but there are certain stereotypes or routines that you can fall into, and you should try to break those. If you go for the different take on the situation, your readers are more likely to be engaged in your story, and you'll find yourself to be more proud of it too.

-Don't be afraid to go out of your comfort zone!

· I talked about this in a previous chapter, but going out of your comfort zone allows you to explore new ideas, ways to characterize, and different takes on a concept you thought you already knew. I know it sound cliché, but if you don't take any risks, you're not going to improve, so be willing to change things up from time to time.

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-Don't write in a note on your phone.

· The screen is too small; you are going to miss all kinds of mistakes. If you write on paper or a computer the quality of your story will improve.

- Don't be afraid of taking a small idea and just running with it

· This is similar to going out of your comfort zone that I have mentioned in the past, but in this case, as I said, the original idea was one line. The only thing I had in my head when I began work on Harsh Storm was the scene where Virgil strikes Thomas, but as I went it blossomed into something much bigger than that. When it comes to a small idea, it can always develop into something much larger if you allow your mind to expand on it while you work

-Strenuous / Life or Death Situations

· This is something I discovered long ago in writing a completely different story, but what I realized is that when a character / characters are put under immense pressure, you have a lot more creative freedom. When anyone is put into a strenuous / life or death situation where anger, grief, fear, confusion, etc. is their drive it opens new doors. People react differently under pressure than they would at any other time, which allows for character development in a very short time frame, and to see emotions or reactions that you would otherwise not have.

-Different writing styles between points of view.

· Now, this one can be rather difficult to do, and I don't suggest working with this until you have a few stories under your belt. Either way, if you are going between the points of view of multiple characters, there are other ways to distinguish that than just using dialogue, thoughts, or just blatantly stating it.

For example, as I said earlier, when writing for Logan I like to use larger words and more complex ways of saying things when I describe the setting.

For Roman, I use words that are more likely to appear in fairytale type writings.

For Virgil, I spend more time describing settings because he is more likely to notice small details. 

This is a particularly difficult skill to pick up on, but if you think you are ready to try it, you will find that your story is more stylized to the characters, and draws your readers in more.

-How far is too far.

· One thing I ran into with this story was that I needed to come up with different types of insults and generally hurtful comments. In this case you need to know the characters and your readership, because you don't want either one holding a grudge after the resolution. The best thing I can say for this one is if you think it is going to cause repercussions, it probably will.

-Technical Lingo / Teaching

· I think it is good to introduce readers to a topic or specific parts of a topic that they may not know about, but you have to be careful about how this is carried out. Too much lingo in any story is going to either lose your reader's interest or pander to a very small audience, therefore losing overall readership. Try to only introduce a few new terms, and be sure to have them explained, but make sure you aren't necessarily trying to dumb down the story.

This is actually an issue I have watched a lot of people run into when writing (myself included in the earlier years), readers are much more intelligent than most other presume. I despise reading a story where it is painfully obvious that someone is over explaining a topic, and though it is not their intention, it just comes across to me as an assumption of ignorance.

Overall, be willing to put in new terms and topics, explain them briefly, and then get one with the story. If a read doesn't quite understand and wants to know more, then they are perfectly capable of researching the topic themselves.